A distracting study break at home in Poland

FRESH START:THE EASTER BREAK finally arrived and I boarded a plane to go home to Poland. As I stood in the check-in queue, I noticed a family with some loud young children, a guy on his own looking like he wanted to make conversation, and a girl with a noisy iPod. I wondered who I would end up with on the flight.

It was, however, not a case of who, but what. I met up with a horrible virus that has struck me down and confined me to my bed for the first week of my Polish break. It's bad luck - the snow has been falling in Poland and outside my window it looks like Christmas. I would love to wrap up and head out into the snow with my little sausage dog, Dino. A romp in the snow would be just the thing for the two us, but I have to lie here in my bed, watching TV for 12 hours a day instead.

Because I haven't seen TV in such a long time, I can't get enough of it. I am especially addicted to the Hallmark Channel, and seem to have an appetite for pretty much anything they throw at me. Like Law and Order: Special Victims Unit. Or Diagnosis Murder. Or what about Intelligence Season? If you're going to spend your study week watching television, surely that's the kind of programme you should be bending your brain around.

When I'm not in the mood for elite squads of detectives, there's always the perfect world of Seventh Heaven. Nothing really bad ever happens, everyone has good intentions, or learns to do the right thing, and it's all dubbed into Polish and spoon-fed to me in my bed. I did a search on the programme on the internet recently (I work hard to bring you the best diary I can, readers) and found the following plot keywords: disturbing, Christian, melodrama, post-marital sex, unintentional comedy. Well, I like it. Disturbing Christian melodrama on the subject of post-marital sex, dubbed into Polish, just happens to be my favourite TV genre.

My friends have been wonderful. They come to visit me every day and we talk for hours about the gossip I've missed and the dreams and aspirations we are all weaving. Most of us are about to turn 18; many of my pals are just finishing school this year. We are all looking to the future. One of my friends wants to be a lawyer, another is hoping to study microbiology. My buddies all have high ambitions, but none so high as the one who wants to study at Harvard. No one wants to be doctor, except me. Here in Poland, we all have aspirations to go to college. Back in school in Ireland, I had friends who were looking to a different path. Like the guy that wanted to go to the UK and appear on Big Brother. Interesting career plan.

Another good friend of mine wants to be a teacher. It's a risky business in Poland. The students here are sure of their rights.

I know that in Ireland it's getting harder for teachers to tell students what to do. Some even complain that giving out homework is a hit and miss affair - you may never get it back and if you don't, you can't say much about it.

Here in Poland, some teachers have been complaining of getting bullied by parents if their children don't get an A. Medicine might be tough, but at least it's just one patient at a time and you don't (usually) have to deal with parents threatening you if they don't like your diagnosis.

When the temperature comes down and I've had my fill of too-good-to-be-true TV families and detective squads, I will have to return to the vexed question of my exams. The reason I came to Poland to study is that I have no pressures here. No bills to pay. No meals to prepare. No driving to college through terrible traffic in a clapped-out car. The trouble is, I forgot that when I come here I have company, entertainment and snow. None of these things is going to help me get back to the books.

I'm quite terrified about these exams. This time last year as I wrote about the impending Leaving Cert, I was feeling quite confident. I knew what to study, and how. There were study guides, understanding teachers, exam-focused textbooks and plenty of advice.I wanted to get a certain number of points so that I could study medicine. Now I'm like the girl who suddenly got everything she ever wanted. I don't know quite what to do with it. My course is full of theory I may never use, and my exams are not so easy to predict. I have a pile of books, but I don't know what to study.

Dino is licking my hand and my best friend is calling over in an hour. The perfect Camden family are celebrating Thanksgiving on Seventh Heaven and my grandmother has just made me lunch. Poland may not be the best place in the world for study, but there's no place like home.

Miroslawa Gorecka is a first-year medicine student at NUI Galway